Electrical connector arrangements for interconnecting the conductors of a multiple conductor cable and the like with the terminal pins of a backplane or other electrical components are well known in the art. One such connector arrangement is described, for example, in the patent of R. W. Rollings, U.S. Pat. No. 4,066,316, issued Jan. 3, 1978, which connector employs as its basic circuit completion element an electrical contact which at one end provides for the piercing of the conductor insulation to reach the conductor. At its other end, the contact has formed thereon a pair of opposing spring blades which present a receptacle for a terminal pin, the blades clasping the pin by opposing spring action when inserted therebetween. Banks of the contacts are fitted into rectangular slots provided therefor in an insulative housing, the front face of which presents corresponding banks of funnel-like capture cones for facilitating the entry of a corresponding array of terminal pins into the contact receptacles. In order to ensure that the receptacle blades are sufficiently separated to admit the pins, each of the housing slots is provided with ribs on its opposing side walls upon which ribs the contact blades ride during their fitting in the connector assembly. The ribs thus slightly separate the receptacle blades against the urging of their closing spring action.
Other connector contact arrangements providing specifically different conductor terminations are also known in the art. Thus, for example, a contact at its conductor terminating end could provide for soldered connections to a printed wiring board rather than to insulated conductors of a cable. Whatever the conductor terminating end of the connector, this invention is chiefly concerned with the contact pin receptacle end and, more particularly, with the problems encountered in their assembly in the connector. The contacts are typically inserted in their respective slots, receptacle end first, from the rear of the connector, the slightly outwardly flared opposing blade ends normally being separated by the side wall ribs of the slots and then riding thereon until the contact is fully inserted. On occasion, however, because of the misalignment or bent blade end, both of the blades may be forced between the top or bottom wall and one side of the slot side wall ribs. Not only is the entry of a terminal pin at the defective receptacle thus blocked, but the full fitting of other pins in the connector may be prevented as well.
Visual inspection of the connectors for defectively fitted contacts is not only time consuming but, because of their extremely small dimensions (adapted in a typical case to receive pins of 0.025 inch to a side), may also be less than completely reliable. It is thus an objective of this invention to provide new and novel apparatus for facilitating the inspection of the contacts of electrical connectors for proper fit. Specifically, this invention concerns apparatus for performing this inspection automatically for also significantly decreasing inspection time.